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Poland: Position of the Stefan Batory Foundation’s Legal Expert Group on the procedure for selecting Supreme Court judges

7 September 2018, Warsaw

Dear Sir or Madam,

I am writing to raise your attention to a gross violation of rule of law standards in Poland.

Polish authorities are currently selecting new Supreme Court judges in a way which openly violates the Constitution: the announcement of vacancies was not counter-signed by the Prime Minister, and the National Council of the Judiciary (which carries out the selection of judges) operates in an unconstitutional composition.

This selection procedure is not only invalid but also highly unreliable, as candidates are named remarkably quickly, without assessing their abilities, on the basis of unclear criteria and under exclusion of public scrutiny.

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